Seung Hui Cho

August 4, 2011 | By Shane Goldmacher and Michael Muskal, Los Angeles Times

The Virginia Tech campus, where 33 people died in a shooting spree in 2007, was on lockdown Thursday morning after reports by school officials that a gunman had been sighted. In an alert posted on its website, the university said a person with what may be a gun had been sighted near Dietrick Hall at the campus in Blacksburg, Va. "Stay inside. Secure doors," the alert urged the campus community. "People on campus stay indoors until further notice," the university ordered.

WASHINGTON -- Virginia Tech cannot be held liable for failing to warn the campus and its student body that a crazed gunman was on the loose, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled Thursday, throwing out a jury's wrongful-death verdict in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. The state justices said university officials have a legal duty to alert the student body only when they have reason to suspect a campus-wide danger. And the mass shooting that occurred on April 16, 2007, in which a gunman killed 32 and then himself, could not have been “reasonably foreseen” in time to warn the campus, the justices said.

A suspect has been taken into custody after a shooting at a community college office in a Virginia shopping mall where two women were wounded, officials said Friday. The first reports of the shooting came in to officials at 1:55 p.m., police said at a televised news conference, and authorities responded within moments to the New River Community College satellite office in the mall just south of Blacksburg, Va., home to Virginia Tech, police said. One woman was airlifted to a hospital and the other was taken for treatment by ambulance, police said.

A suspect has been taken into custody after a shooting at a community college office in a Virginia shopping mall where two women were wounded, officials said Friday. The first reports of the shooting came in to officials at 1:55 p.m., police said at a televised news conference, and authorities responded within moments to the New River Community College satellite office in the mall just south of Blacksburg, Va., home to Virginia Tech, police said. One woman was airlifted to a hospital and the other was taken for treatment by ambulance, police said.

Virginia Tech did not violate federal law in its email response time that notified students of a campus rampage that left 33 people dead, the worst mass shooting by a gunman in U.S. history, a judge ruled Friday. The Department of Education had fined the university $55,000 for waiting more than two hours after the first round of gunfire to send out an email warning students, teachers and others to take cover. But the department's chief administrative judge, Ernest C. Canellos, found that the university did not violate a law requiring timely warnings of safety threats and overturned the fine.

WASHINGTON -- Virginia Tech cannot be held liable for failing to warn the campus and its student body that a crazed gunman was on the loose, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled Thursday, throwing out a jury's wrongful-death verdict in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. The state justices said university officials have a legal duty to alert the student body only when they have reason to suspect a campus-wide danger. And the mass shooting that occurred on April 16, 2007, in which a gunman killed 32 and then himself, could not have been “reasonably foreseen” in time to warn the campus, the justices said.

August 4, 2011 | By Shane Goldmacher and Michael Muskal, Los Angeles Times

Virginia Tech lifted a lockdown Thursday more than five hours after three youths reported seeing a man carrying what may have been a gun covered with a cloth on the campus where 33 people died in a mass shooting four years ago. Authorities scoured the campus and even released a composite police sketch of the man, but uncovered no new information. At 2:41 p.m. EDT, the university posted a note on its website declaring an end to the lockdown under which students, faculty and others had been asked to remain indoors.

The 23-year-old student who went on a bloody rampage at Virginia Tech had prepared the attack for weeks -- buying two semiautomatic pistols and writing a dark, hate-filled rant in his dormitory room before setting out with a backpack of ammunition to kill students and teachers, authorities said Tuesday.

The Virginia Tech gunman's missing mental health records have been found at the home of a former university counseling official more than two years after the bloodbath. The belated emergence of Seung-hui Cho's file, a development disclosed in a memo obtained Wednesday by the Associated Press, represents another embarrassing lapse in the case and raises questions about how such evidence could be lost for so long.

Re "Report weaves dark tale of gunman's past," Aug. 31 The panel appointed by Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine faulted Virginia Tech for not taking more precautions in protecting the students and faculty against the shooter, Seung-hui Cho. Yet the governor was careful not to mention that Virginia was also to blame because state law allowed a person who was adjudicated to be mentally unsound to purchase a handgun. Jean Strauber Encino

Virginia Tech did not violate federal law in its email response time that notified students of a campus rampage that left 33 people dead, the worst mass shooting by a gunman in U.S. history, a judge ruled Friday. The Department of Education had fined the university $55,000 for waiting more than two hours after the first round of gunfire to send out an email warning students, teachers and others to take cover. But the department's chief administrative judge, Ernest C. Canellos, found that the university did not violate a law requiring timely warnings of safety threats and overturned the fine.

August 4, 2011 | By Shane Goldmacher and Michael Muskal, Los Angeles Times

The Virginia Tech campus, where 33 people died in a shooting spree in 2007, was on lockdown Thursday morning after reports by school officials that a gunman had been sighted. In an alert posted on its website, the university said a person with what may be a gun had been sighted near Dietrick Hall at the campus in Blacksburg, Va. "Stay inside. Secure doors," the alert urged the campus community. "People on campus stay indoors until further notice," the university ordered.

August 4, 2011 | By Shane Goldmacher and Michael Muskal, Los Angeles Times

Virginia Tech lifted a lockdown Thursday more than five hours after three youths reported seeing a man carrying what may have been a gun covered with a cloth on the campus where 33 people died in a mass shooting four years ago. Authorities scoured the campus and even released a composite police sketch of the man, but uncovered no new information. At 2:41 p.m. EDT, the university posted a note on its website declaring an end to the lockdown under which students, faculty and others had been asked to remain indoors.

The Virginia Tech gunman's missing mental health records have been found at the home of a former university counseling official more than two years after the bloodbath. The belated emergence of Seung-hui Cho's file, a development disclosed in a memo obtained Wednesday by the Associated Press, represents another embarrassing lapse in the case and raises questions about how such evidence could be lost for so long.

The 23-year-old student who went on a bloody rampage at Virginia Tech had prepared the attack for weeks -- buying two semiautomatic pistols and writing a dark, hate-filled rant in his dormitory room before setting out with a backpack of ammunition to kill students and teachers, authorities said Tuesday.

The Virginia Tech building where a student killed 30 people and himself was reopened for limited daytime use of engineering labs, although access was restricted because of refurbishing work. The closure of Norris Hall after the April 16 shooting rampage had stalled research by about 50 graduate students. The second-floor classrooms where Seung-Hui Cho shot 25 students and five faculty members will not be used again.